Evaluation of Life Quality and Dyspnea Intensity on Chronic Airway Diseases Patients in Pulmonary Rehabilitation Program

Abstract

The chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and asthma are chronic airway diseases that cause considerable physical, emotional and social restrictions. The life quality of patients who suffer from these diseases, is more affected by dyspnea then by other symptoms. That way is possible to correlate the impact of dyspnea on their life quality. The Pulmonary Rehabilitation Program (PRP) helps to improve the physical fitness and quality of life. This paper presents a study of the life quality and the dyspnea intensity in chronic lung disease patients. The research has participation of fourteen patients, distributed as seven suffering from COPD and the other seven suffering from asthma, for both gender and with an age average of 74.2 ± 8.9. The patients answer the following questionnaires: Baseline Dyspnea Index (BDI), Medical Research Council (MRC) Dyspnea Scale, Airways Questionnaire 20 (AQ20) and the Brazilian version of the Short-Form (SF-36) life quality questionnaire. From the present study, it was concluded that asthma patients have a less impaired life quality, since the dyspnea intensity is lesser, compared to the one with COPD.